MB Civic

By Dante Ramos, Editor | The Boston Globe | Sunday, October 21, 2007

“…Cambodia’s capital is bustling these days, and people who live here say the streets are ever more choked with motorbikes and cars. But that wasn’t the case earlier this month as Cambodians observed Pchum Ben, the Festival of the Dead. Phnom Penh looked like a ghost town, because many residents had returned to their home provinces. People across the country gathered at Buddhist temples to honor their ancestors and other relatives.

Acknowledging the dead is a more pressing duty here than in most countries, after decades of war that ended only in the late 1990s. The worst occurred from 1975 to 1979, when the Khmer Rouge were responsible for the deaths of about 1.7 million Cambodians, though estimates vary. But with a new tribunal investigating the remaining leaders of that regime, the country has a chance to get out from under the weight of its history….”…BS

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2007/10/21/a_festival_of_death?mode=PF